Category Archives: Lean Mass

Post #55 – Gravity-Based Life Style for Optimal Health

30 Saturday Jul 2016

Posted by in Lean Mass, Living to 120, Optimal Exercise, Optimal Health, Uncategorized, Vigor, Vitality, Yoga

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On Father’s Day this year, my wife gave me an Apple Watch as a gift. And, as you can probably guess, I went straight to the fitness apps.

Apple watch allows you to continuously measure heart rate, daily steps walked, and the distance walked.  You can also set it to remind you to stand up, as I often as you tell it to and it keeps track of how many times you actually did stand up. And, it gives you at-a-boys for hitting and moving toward your goals. So, I starting using all these features right away.

But soon after I was wondering: What does the research say about the benefits of daily activities such as standing, walking etc.? Is their science behind this or is it just a gimmick?

Sitting Kills, Moving Heals

My first step was to carefully read the book we had already in the house: Sitting Kills, Moving Heals by Joan Vernikos, Ph.D., former Director of NASA’s Life Sciences Division.  She spent her whole life working at NASA studying the ill effects on astronauts of space travel and living in space in zero gravity. More importantly, she studied how to minimize these ill effects and how to rehabilitate astronauts when they return to earth’s gravity.

Sitting Kills

And, even more importantly, Vernikos and other scientists also made the key connection that sitting on earth is the same as living in zero gravity. Having made that connection, they found that much of the research for space living becomes relevant to those of us who are earth bound.

According to Vernikos, when astronauts spend time in space, here are the kinds of health issues they develop:

  • Blood volume reduced
  • Body weight and mass decreases
  • Increased calcium excretion
  • Increased risk of kidney stones
  • Heart shrinks – cardiac output decreased
  • Heart muscle wall becomes thinner
  • Red blood cells reduced.
  • Stamina/aerobic capacity reduced
  • Lowered growth hormone response to exercise
  • Muscle atrophy; loss of muscle mass
  • Muscle strength reduced; size of fiber decreased
  • Fat moves in to replace muscle mass
  • Muscle sensitivity to insulin reduced
  • Muscle less able to take up sugar
  • Sense of taste and hearing dulled
  • Biological rhythm disturbed
  • Calcium lost from bone
  • Bone mass and density decreased
  • Increased risk of bladder infection
  • Delayed wound healing
  • Testosterone reduced

The list sounds pretty awful, doesn’t it?  After reading this list, you wonder why would anyone want to go live in space.

But these are the same effects that you see as people age on earth.

And, here is the kicker: Space research shows that these conditions induced through Gravity Deprivation Syndrome (GDS) are reversible once you get astronauts re-introduced to gravity.  It often takes almost one day of re-conditioning with gravity for each day spent in space to fully recover.

What about earth-bound people like you and I? We experience GDS is through sedentary life style. Through sitting and bed rest, we experience zero gravity like condition.

GDS starts as early as age 20.   Using bone density loss as a measure of GDS, earth-bound people experience a bone loss at the rate of about 10% per decade. No wonder, by 70’s and 80’s most people have serious osteoporosis conditions with frail bones.

These sedantary lifestyle induced GDS is the reason we are now hearing catch phrases like: Sitting Kills; Sitting is the new Smoking, etc.

How to Overcome Gravity Deprivation Syndrome (GDS)

Through studies and experimentation, researchers have found that to counter the effects of GDS, standing up often is what matters, not how long you remain standing.

Every time you stand up, the body initiates a shift in fluids, volume, hormones and causes muscle contraction to occur, and almost every nerve in the body is stimulated. If you stand up 16 times a day for two minutes, the body would read that as 16 stimuli, whereas if you stood once and remained standing for 32 minutes, it would see that as one stimulus.

Gym Workouts are No Substitute

Another surprising result: Gym workouts of 30 to 60 minute even daily may not be total replacement for activities required to counter GDS. To counter GDS, one needs to exercise stabilizer muscles that include tendons, ligaments, and other connective tissues. Most folks focus on mobilizer muscles that include thighs, biceps, hamstrings, triceps, chest muscles, abs etc.

James Levine an exercise physiologist at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, MN, coined the term Non-Exercise Activity Thermogenesis (NEAT). NEAT is defined as the small, brief, yet frequent muscular movements one makes throughout the day, of which changing position is the most effective. Here are some examples of NEAT movements, other than standing up:

  • Bending over to pick up something
  • Squatting
  • Stretching upward to take something off a shelf
  • Getting dressed and undressed
  • Playing a musical instrument
  • Stirring a pot
  • Crossing and uncrossing your legs
  • Waving one’s hands while talking
  • Fidgeting

So, more such activities we do, the more effects of GDS we overcome, even though we do not break a sweat.

Bottom Line

 Extrapolating extensive research conducted for space travels, shows that Gravity Deprivation Syndrome (GDS) has serious consequences to our health.  These symptoms of detrimental health due to GDS are often associated with aging, but actually are due to decreased activity as people grow old. Achieving and maintaining optimal health requires strategies to maximize activities to counter the effects of GDS.

The following is a list of some very effective actions to counter GDS:

  • Stand up sit Down
  • Stand tall
  • Stretch at your desk
  • Walk tall
  • Take the stairs instead of elevator
  • Practice balancing when you put on and take off your pants, shoes and socks
  • Use a broom
  • Play on swings; use rocking chairs
  • Dance
  • Play catch; throw Frisbee
  • Do yoga

Remember that exercise is not for gym any more.  So, as often as possible, inconvenience yourself by:

  • Parking far away from the destination,
  • Taking stairs instead of elevators,
  • Stepping up on escalators,
  • Walking instead of taking people movers,
  • Getting up frequently to reach for things, and
  • Carrying your brief case instead of rolling.

All these action help in keeping your stabilizer muscles in top shape for optimal health.

What are your thoughts on this subject?

Would love to hear from you and learn from you.

Please click on Comment to leave your comments or question so others can benefit from your input.

Post #44 – How to protect from the down-side of strength training?

05 Monday Oct 2015

Posted by in Bikram Yoga, Lean Mass, Optimal Exercise, Optimal Health

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We have all heard about the benefits of strength training or weight training:

  1. It helps keep the fat weight lost off for good
  2. It protects bone health and helps build muscle mass
  3. It makes you stronger and fitter
  4. It helps build better body mechanics improving balance
  5. It plays a key role in disease prevention, e. g. improving insulin sensitivity and HDL cholesterol
  6. It boost your energy level and your mood
  7. It improves your metabolism so your burn more calories even when not working out

With so many benefits, it seems no brainer that strength training must be part of life style of anyone pursuing Optimal Health.  

If you search on Amazon.com, you will find hundreds of books on strength and weight training.  These books elaborate on the benefits and various techniques of strength training.  Here are two that use scientific basis in their approach.

Thes slow burn fitness revolution41B2S96EXYL

Is there any downside to the strength training?  What could possibly go wrong?

If you do a quick Google search on this topic, you will find that Injuries is what most people caution about as the downside of weight training.

That makes sense. Major types of injuries during weight training are hairline fractures, pulled muscles and damaged joints.  The causes of these injuries often are:

  • Using Impropriate weights
  • Not using proper form
  • Carelessness
  • Accidents

Making sure that you take precautions to avoid such injuries is very important. Even when you are very careful and conscientious, avoiding wrong form while strength training can require a lot of vigilance. That’s where it is important to learn from a trainer the basics of using weight, machines and even your weight.

However, in my experience, there is something even more subtle and insidious that can potentially creep in and that is easily preventable, if you are vigilant. And, no one seems to talk about this topic.

So, let me tell you my story to illustrate what this insidious issue is and lessons I learned on how to prevent it.

MY STORY

Many years ago, I used to do a simple yoga routine few days a week. I found that over time, my body became quite flexible. I felt energetic.  I did have spring in my feet. However, I found that my strength was continuing to decline. I was even surprised how few pushups I could do at a time. Abdominal fat around my belly was slowly getting worse.  I was becoming what we now call “skinny fat”.

So, I figured, instead of yoga, I would switch to exercise routine that involved working with light weights and body weight. As I started this new strength training routine, I found that I was getting stronger every week. I could do more and more pushups at a time. After several months, I even achieved my stretch goal of doing one hundred pushups in a single rep!

Then after about a year, I went back and tried my yoga routine. I immediately discovered that my flexibility had significantly decreased.  I was quite discouraged that within a year while I had made so much progress in my strength, I had lost the flexibility and even some balance.

At that point in time, I ran into my trainer Saleem, who I still work out with over 13 years later. I told him my dilemma and he showed me how to stretch my muscle after EACH weight training exercise.  So, if I had just done curls, I would stretch my biceps. If I had done squats and I would stretch my quads and so on. Doing these stretches routinely as part of my workouts, I noticed that it helped me retain flexibility in muscles while building strength. Training with him, I would also start my workout always with proper warmups and finish the workout with some cool down stretches.

Then Saleem started to add stretch workout days in between strength training workout days. So, after 4 or 5 sessions of weight training, he might add a stretch workout day. On the Stretch Workout day, we would simply do all stretching exercises – stretching back, hamstrings, quads, front, all big muscles and small muscles. With this new regimen I noticed that I was retaining my flexibility as I was developing strength.

In spite of all these precautions, about four years ago, I hurt my right shoulder from the workouts.  I was able to fix most of it by doing the various stretches etc. However, as I would lift my right arm, I would feel resistance and even pain in my shoulder- may be at a level of 1 to 3 on a scale of 10. That led me to start doing Bikram Yoga, about 3 ½ years ago.  As the shoulder got more and more limber with Bikram Yoga, resistance or pain at a level of 1 out of 10 still remained.  And this resistance/pain would get worse, whenever I did bench presses or some other exercises that put strain on my shoulder.

At that point, I really got curious. I wanted to figure out what exactly would it take for my shoulder to be 100% recovered and normal.

I found various methods of making my shoulders further limber.  Using foam rollers, such as below, was a big help.

Blue Foam RollerRumble Roller

Then I found massage balls (lacrosse balls), shown below. With these massage balls, I would find muscles around neck and shoulders that were tight and then use the ball to relieve pressure and loosen those tight muscles.

massage balls

Finally, I decided to engage a massage therapist to work those muscles.  And, she immediately found tight muscles and worked on those to loosen them up.  And, finally, my right shoulder got to a point of 100% recovered and normal.

MORAL OF MY STORY

So, what is the moral of this story? Here is the insidious process that I discovered:

  • Weight training induces tightness in muscles since strength training by design involves contracting of muscles
  • It requires active work to dissipate tightness in the muscles by stretching, foam rolling and/or massaging
  • If not properly loosened, during the following workouts your form may change subconsciously to compensate for the tight muscles, which may in-turn cause some other functional issues
  • Over time these compounding issues, like the layers of an onion, may give rise to issues whose root cause may be buried deep and not be readily visible.
  • Truly fixing such issues requires series of actions to fix one issue at a time, like peeling the onions, until you get to the root cause.Otherwise all fixes will be temporary.

BOTTOMLINE

If you are engaged in strength training, it is important to be hyper-aware of the tightness in muscles.

Incorporate yoga, stretching, foam rolling and massaging into your routines to immediately dissipate any tightness.  

Chronic musco-skeletal issues can be cured by working on muscles as peeling the layers of an onion. However, it may require a lot of patience.

What do you think of this topic?

Have you had similar experiences?

What has been your approach to stay limber while developing strength?

I would love to hear from you.  Please leave comments and questions to share your knowledge and wisdom.

Post #43 – What is the role of Testosterone Replacement Therapy for Optimal Health?

07 Monday Sep 2015

Posted by in Aging, Lean Mass, Optimal Health, Percent Body Fat, Supplements, Vigor, Vitality

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“Are you tired? Have you lost your edge, you sense of vitality, your ‘mojo’? Does sex feel like work, or maybe it does not work out any more? Is your mood blah? Have you put on a gut even though you don’t seem to be eating any more than your ever did? May be it is your age. Or maybe just maybe, you have a medical condition called low testosterone, or, as I prefer to call it low T.”

So starts the book Testosterone for Life, by Abraham Morgentaler, M.D., Associate Clinical Professor at Harvard Medical School.

Testosterone for Life

In my previous blogs, I mentioned how early last year, for the first time in my life, I did a comprehensive blood tests. I got these tests done through Life Extension Foundation. These test included all basic hormones.

Only two items showed up not within the “Reference Ranges”: A1c and Free Testosterone. With respect to the LabCorp’s reference rages, my Hemoglobin A1c value of 5.8 was too high (reference range 4.8 to 5.6), even though my fasting Glucose was 91, well within the reference range.

On the other hand, my Free Testosterone value of 5.5 was too low (Reference Range 7.2 to 24.0), while Total Testosterone, DHEA-Sulfate and Estradiol where all within the reference rage.

Now I was quite familiar with A1c, even though I expected it to be normal since my fasting glucose has always been stable around 90 during all my wellness tests.

But Testosterone I did not know anything about. So, I hit the books. The above referenced book by Dr. Morgentaler was one of the first authoritative books I read on the subject. Male Hormone Restoration is another good source. There are also many papers on this subject on NIH Pubmed, for example: The benefits and risks of testosterone replacement therapy: a review.

One of the guidance that Dr. Morgentaler and others practitioners offer is that not all low Testosterone (or Low-T) cases need to be treated. Physicians must examine low-T blood test measurements and correlate with the clinical symptoms. List of symptoms looks the same as at the top of this post for this condition called Hypogonadism:

  • Are you tired?
  • Have you lost your edge, you sense of vitality, your ‘mojo’?
  • Do you have no or low libido (desire for sex)?
  • Do you have erectile dysfunction?
  • Is your mood blah?
  • Have you put on a gut even though you don’t seem to be eating any more than your ever did?
  • Do you have difficulty building muscle mass, bone mass or gaining strength even with workouts and right nutrition?

So per recommendation of practitioners, if some combination of above symptoms exists along with low-T, boosting testosterone may be in order.

I could answer yes to several of the questions above. I had also noticed that fat loss and muscle gain had also plateaued in spite of my continued regime of workouts and nutrition. In fact, in the book, The Life Plan, Jeffry S. Life, M.D., describes how at one point in life low-T became an impediment to maintaining his body composition.

The life plan

I immediately researched and added some supplements to my regime: Miraforte from Life Extension and Male Rejuvenator from Xtend-life. Over the following six months I noticed my Free Testosterone improve as much as 70%. However, my A1c even to increase.

Concerned with trend of my A1c, about six months ago, I started working with Benjamin Gonzalez, M.D. who specializes in functional medicine and hormone replacement therapy (HRT).

After reviewing my tests, conditions and efforts, Dr. Gonzalez started prescribing Testosterone Replacement Therapy (TRT).  In fact, he like many researchers, believes that optimal testosterone levels should be on the high end of the range, close to what men in their 20s will have. This can be a source of slowing down or reversing many age related issues.

The only known downside of TRT is that it is that the supplementation is not recommended if you have enlarged prostates – although that risk is still not proven in the research. 

The treatment involved once a day regime of DHEA supplements as pills and bio-identical testosterone applied as topical cream on wrists. It took about six weeks, before the impact of TRT became apparent. I started noticing that:

  • My daily energy level and “mojo” is up
  • Sexual performance is much better
  • Libido is much improved
  • My fat loss and muscle gain has resumed.

Just last week, I did a set of follow up tests and review with Dr. G. – about six months since starting TRT and coincidental with my 61st birthday. Free Testosterone, DHEA-Sulfate and Estradiol levels are now actually higher than the high end of respective reference ranges.   As a result, Dr. G. has advised, backing down somewhat the daily amount of testosterone.

Fortunately, my wife has also chosen to undergo HRT at the same time I did to balance and optimize her own hormones.  She is also experiencing very positive results.  So, we are well matched in energy and libido.  How lucky for me!

Having gone further up, my hemoglobin A1c is back down to 5.8, but I don’t have enough data points to see if the improvement in A1c is correlated to testosterone levels. So, getting my A1c down is still an active chase for me.

In the past couple of months, I have been talking to my friends and family, especially those over 50 to get their Testosterone levels checked and pursue treatments the levels are low and they have symptoms of hypogonadism.

To bring this issue to light, many researcher have been popularizing the term Andropause, which is like menopause for women.  However, for most men, the decline of testosterone is very gradual starting in their 30s and is not a sudden event as for most women.

So, how about you? Have you had any experience with hormone replacement?

What was your experience?

I would love to hear, so I can and others learn from your knowledge and experience.

Post #28 – Eating for Optimal Health Part VII – Best beverage to drink is pure water

16 Sunday Nov 2014

Posted by in Ideal Body Weight, Lean Mass, Life-Span, Living to 120, meditation, Nutrition, Optimal Health, Optimal Nutrition, Reversing Chronic Diseases, Vitality

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In blog post of 9/29/2014: So, what should you eat for optimal health?, I listed the seven basic principles I have extracted from the many diet books and resources I have studied. These principles are:

  1. What you eat, how much you eat and when you eat, all matter
  2. Eat clean
  3. Eat lots of vegetables and fruits
  4. Use only healthy fats and fat sources
  5. Incorporate sufficient proteins in your diet
  6. Best beverage to drink is pure water
  7. Add or subtract specific foods based on your personal needs

In the last posts, we discussed the first five of these principles. Today, let’s focus on the fifth principle: Best beverage to drink is pure water. And, as usual without any fluff stuff, let’s get to it.

I am sure by now you have heard over and over again, “Keep yourself hydrated.” Or “Drink plenty of water”. But why do we need to keep hydrated?

Water is the solvent for biochemical reactions and has unique physical properties (e.g., high specific heat) to absorb metabolic heat within the body.

Water is also essential for maintaining vascular volume and serves as the medium for transport within the body by supplying nutrients and removing waste. In addition, cell hydration has been has been suggested to be an important signal to regulate cell metabolism and gene expression.

Water is the largest component of human bodies. About 70% of our body weight is water. To maintain homeostasis, i.e., equilibrium in our biology, we need to replenish the daily water loss. Water loss comes from breathing out, sweating, urination and excretion.

You may have noticed feeling sluggish if you are dehydrated. In fact dehydration can bring on a variety of symptoms:

Mild to moderate dehydration is likely to cause:

  • Dry, sticky mouth
  • Sleepiness or tiredness — children are likely to be less active than usual
  • Thirst
  • Decreased urine output
  • No wet diapers for three hours for infants
  • Few or no tears when crying
  • Dry skin
  • Headache
  • Constipation
  • Dizziness or lightheadedness

Severe dehydration, a medical emergency, can cause:

  • Extreme thirst
  • Extreme fussiness or sleepiness in infants and children; irritability and confusion in adults
  • Very dry mouth, skin and mucous membranes
  • Little or no urination — any urine that is produced will be darker than normal
  • Sunken eyes
  • Shriveled and dry skin that lacks elasticity and doesn’t “bounce back” when pinched into a fold
  • In infants, sunken fontanels — the soft spots on the top of a baby’s head
  • Low blood pressure
  • Rapid heartbeat
  • Rapid breathing
  • No tears when crying
  • Fever
  • In the most serious cases, delirium or unconsciousness

Many diseases are linked to dehydration. These include kidney stones, gall stones, bladder, colon and other cancers, arrhythmias, blood clots, Mitral Valve Prolapse, and Osteoporosis.

How much water do we need?

So, given that we need to keep body hydrated, that is, replace the H2O we lose daily with equivalent amount of H2O, how much water do we need everyday?

Institute of Medicine of the National Academies report on Dietary Reference Intake for Water, Potassium, Sodium, Chloride and Sulfate recommends the following DAILY Recommended intakes for water for different age groups:

For Children

1–3 years         1.3 L total; 0.9 L (4 cups) as beverages

4–8 years         1.7 L total; 1.2 L (5 cups) as beverages

For Males

9–13 years       2.4 L total; 1.8 L (8 cups) as beverages

14–18 years     3.3 L total; 2.6 L (11 cups) as beverages

Over 19 years   3.7 L total; 3.0 L (13 cups) as beverages

 For Females

9–13 years       2.1 L/day of total water; 1.6 L (7 cups)

14–18 years     2.3 L/day of total water; 1.8 L (8 cups)

Over 19 years   2.7 L total; 2.2 L (9 cups) as beverages

Pregnant and Lactating women are exception and will need even more for each respective age group.

Can you drink too much water?

In very unusual circumstances, excess consumption of water and low sodium intake may lead to excess body water, resulting in hyponatremia and cellular edema. This condition comes from body getting too low in sodium rather than too much water.

What are the sources for water?

So, given that we need to keep body hydrated, that is replace the H2O we lose daily with equivalent amount of H2O, where do we get it from and where should we get it from?

Well first of all we do get a little bit of it when the body oxidizes hydrogen-containing substances during metabolism or energy production cycle. This water, called Metabolic Water is generally enough to offset the water we breathe out as vapors.

Rest of the water comes from what we consume, i.e., the stuff that crosses our lips. Of course, if you are taking nutrients intravenously (as saline solution or glucose solution in a hospital) that also counts.

All foods, especially, fruits and vegetables contain water. Beverages Coffees, tea, ice tea, milk, sodas, juices, beer all contain water. Institute of Medicine of the National Academies report on Dietary Reference Intake for Water, Potassium, Sodium, Chloride and Sulfate has the following table on daily water intake from a 2,200 calories daily diet. (Please click on the graphic below if it is not readable)

Table

NOTE: This diet meets the Adequate Intake or the Recommended Dietary Allowance for adult men and women for all nutrients for which one has been established (for fiber, it meets the ratio of 14 g/1,000 kcal) and provides energy nutrients within the acceptable macronutrient distribution ranges. Nutrient totals may not equal the sum of the parts, due to rounding. Vegetables prepared without salt.

Food composition data: U.S. Department of Agriculture, Agricultural Research Service, Nutrient Database for Standard Reference, Release 16.

DATA SOURCE: ENVIRON International

So, what is the optimal source of hydration?

When I came to the US, 37 years ago, I somehow created associations that beer is the only drink that really goes with pizza and at McDonald’s you always ate hamburger with French fries and Coke. I don’t know how those associations happened, since I did not eat pizzas or McDonald’s’ hamburgers before coming to the US. I guess it was from watching all those TV commercials or just mimicking what everyone else around me was doing.   In fact, it was four years later that watching a friend of mine, I learned that you could actually ask for water at McDonalds.

Fruits and vegetables are definitely good sources for water. Other than getting water from food, what about beverages? Are all beverages, coffees, tea, ice tea, milk, sodas, juices, beer, and wine as good a source of water?

Given the western culture, the answer could be quite confusing.

In research literature, there seems to be some controversy about whether coffee and alcohol are only transitional diuretics or permanent diuretics. Some say that caffeine and alcohol actually cause dehydration. Others disagree.

And, the citrus industry convinced us over two decades ago that “orange juice is not just for breakfast anymore”, so we should be  drinking that all day long.

Coke and Pepsi, of course, promise us sex and happiness.

“Got Milk” teaches us that all the hip people drink milk and it is a fun drink and of course, it is the only source of calcium out there.

Beer is the real beverage to quench thirst, besides it gets us sex and popularity.

Wine is definitely one for sophisticated people and of course makes us live longer.

All this just to get people to drink their stuff to get hydrated! So, what is one to do?

I tend to agree with Joe Dillon, who likes to say, “Just because it is wet, does not mean it will hydrate you.”

Bottom Line

My take on all this is to ask the basic question: when I drink a beverage for hydration, do I want the collateral stuff?

Whether it is caffeine, or alcohol, or sugars or artificial sweeteners, or artificial colors, or whatever else,  if I do want the collateral stuff, then the particular beverage at that moment is an acceptable, desirable or even a good source of hydration. If not, I rather just drink water.

And, in most of the situations, when I am looking to hydrate myself, I rather go directly to the source of hydration that my body is ultimately looking for, which, of course, is Water.

What do you think of this approach?

Do you feel that this simplifies the confusion about water and hydration?

Do you see a hole in this approach? What would you do differently?

Post #27 – Eating for Optimal Health Part VI – Incorporate sufficient protein in your diet

02 Sunday Nov 2014

Posted by in Ideal Body Weight, Lean Mass, Living to 120, Nutrition, Optimal Health, Optimal Nutrition

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In blog post of 9/29/2014: So, what should you eat for optimal health?, I listed the seven basic principles I have extracted from the many diet books and resources I have studied. These principles are:

  1. What you eat, how much you eat and when you eat, all matter
  2. Eat clean
  3. Eat lots of vegetables and fruits
  4. Use only healthy fats and fat sources
  5. Incorporate sufficient proteins in your diet
  6. Best beverage to drink is pure water
  7. Add or subtract specific foods based on your personal needs

In the last posts, we discussed the first four of these principles. Today, let’s focus on the fifth principle: Incorporate sufficient protein in your diet. And, as usual without any fluff stuff, let’s get to it.

First, what are proteins and what is the big deal?

Proteins are the main building blocks of the body. They’re used to make muscles, tendons, organs and skin. Proteins are also used to make enzymes, hormones, neurotransmitters and various tiny molecules that serve important functions.

Without protein, life as we know it would not be possible.

Proteins are made out of smaller molecules called amino acids, which are linked together like beads on a string. The linked amino acids form long protein chains, which are then folded into complex shapes.

Some of these amino acids can be produced by the body, while we must get others from the diet. The ones we cannot produce and must get from our foods are called the “indispensable” (sometimes also called “essential”) amino acids.

Protein from animal sources such as meat, poultry, fish, eggs, milk, cheese, and yogurt provide all nine indispensable amino acids, and for this reason are referred to as “complete proteins.”

Proteins from plants, legumes, grains, nuts, seeds, and vegetables tend to be deficient in one or more of the indispensable amino acids and are called “incomplete proteins.”

So, how much protein do we need?

There are different opinions on how much protein we actually need.

Most official nutrition organizations recommend a fairly modest protein intake. Food and Nutrition Board of Institute of Medicine of the National Academies in their Dietary Reference Intakes (DRI) reference manual recommends 0.8 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight, or 0.36 grams per pound. This amounts to:

  • 56 grams per day for the average sedentary man.
  • 46 grams per day for the average sedentary woman.

These are clearly amounts below which nutritional deficiency will result. Interestingly, DRI reference manual does not specify any upper limit at which protein might be harmful, although there is quite a bit of discussion about adverse effects of taking too much of a specific amino acid.

Most experts agrees that protein needs depends upon a number of factors that include activity level, age, muscle (or lean) mass and current state of health. 

But still, how much?

The range seems to be from 0.5 gram to 1.0 grams per pound of body weight. In case one is overweight, it is recommended to use lean mass weight to calculate the protein need.

Most optimal health experts, such as Joe Dillon (The Joe Dillon Difference), Dr. Life (Life Plan), Bill Phillips (Body for Life) whose focus is on building optimal muscle mass, recommend amounts on the higher end of the range. That is, 1.0 or 1.2 grams per pound of body weight per day.

What are the best sources of protein?

The factors often discussed in terms of quality of protein are efficiency of absorption, and how “complete” the protein is, i.e., does it contain all indispensable  amino acids. Another important factor I believe is whether eating enough protein will bust your carbs, fats or calories budget.

Eating lots of breads may give you sufficient proteins but it will probably bust the carbs and calories budgets.  Also, eating lots of rich or fatty meats for sufficient protein will most likely bust your fats budget.

Joe Dillon offers the following hierarchy for selecting optimal sources of lean, quality protein (from highest to lowest):

  • 100% Whey protein isolate powder
  • Egg whites
  • Wild Game (venison, buffalo, elk, moose, etc.)
  • Salmon, Ahi Tuna
  • Turkey (white meat, dark meat, no skin)
  • Fish (all kinds)
  • Chicken (white meat only, no skin)
  • Shellfish (oysters, mussels, clams, lobster, shrimp, crab)
  • Nonfat Dairy (nonfat milk, nonfat cheese, nonfat cottage cheese, nonfat plain yogurt)

But how much of these foods should I eat?

Here is a quick guide:

  • 3 ounces of lean meat or poultry contain about 25 g of protein,
  • 3 ounces of fish contain about 20 g of protein
  • 1 cup of soybeans supplies about 20 g of protein.
  • 1 cup of yogurt is approximately 8 g,
  • 1 cup of milk is 8 g
  • 1 egg or 1 ounce of cheese contains about 6 g
  • One cup of legumes has approximately 15 g of protein
  • Cereals, grains, nuts, and vegetables contain about 2 g of protein per serving.

Bottom Line:

Still confused? May be this will help. Looking for optimal nutrition, this is what I am doing:

  1. Since I am interested in continuing to build my lean mass reserves, I decided to budget protein in the upper end of the range, about 1 gram per pound of my body weight. I weigh 161 plus minus 2 pounds these days, so 160 grams of protein per day is my target.
  2. I am a vegetarian, I assume I get about 10 to 20 grams from vegetables, legumes and eggs and egg whites.
  3. I supplement the remaining using shakes of whey isolates or whey concentrates and isolates mixed. That makes for shakes 4 to 5 times a day: breakfast, lunch, while going home from work, post-exercise and sometime before going to bed. If I ate meat, I will do just one or two shakes a day.

What do you think of this approach?

Do you feel that this simplifies the confusion about proteins?

Do you see a hole in this approach? What would you do differently?

Post #23 – Eating for Optimal Health Part II – What you eat, how much you eat and when you eat, all matter.

06 Monday Oct 2014

Posted by in Ideal Body Weight, Lean Mass, Living to 120, Nutrition, Optimal Health, Percent Body Fat, wellness

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Eating for Optimal Health Part II – What you eat, how much you eat and when you eat, all matter.

In last week’s blog post: So, what should you eat for optimal health? – Part I, I listed the seven basic principles I have extracted from the many diet books and resources I have studied. These principles are:

  1. What you eat, how much you eat and when you eat, all matter
  2. Eat clean
  3. Eat lots of vegetables and fruits
  4. Use only healthy fats and fat sources
  5. Incorporate sufficient proteins in your diet
  6. Best beverage to drink is pure water
  7. Add or subtract specific foods based on your personal needs

Today, let’s focus on the very first principle: What you eat, how much you eat and when you eat, all matter. And, without any fluff, let’s get to it.

What you eat: Our physical bodies need:

  • Oxygen
  • Water
  • Macro nutrients: carbs, proteins and fats
  • Micro nutrients: vitamins and minerals
  • Enzymes
  • Bacteria
  • Certain molecules

For optimal health, what we eat needs to provide all these items in optimal quantities. If any of these are taken in insufficient quantities, suboptimal health will result.

How much you eat: One aspect of how much to eat is based on how much energy we need every day. The other aspect is to eat so as to receive optimal quantities for our bodies’ needs a) through g) above.

The first aspect about energy, in-turn depends upon two factors. How many Kcals (or Calories) do we need for the basic metabolic activities (beating heart, circulation of blood, breathing, maintaining body temperature etc.). And, for other physical activities which can depend upon our lifestyle, taking elevators vs. taking stairs, number of steps walked in a day, exercise or no exercise, driving to work or biking to work, doing the work manually or letting machines do the work, etc.

And, there is yet another factor that dictates how much to eat question, i.e., how efficiently is your body able to convert food to energy. Basic metabolic cycle, called Krebs Cycle or the Citric Acid Cycle involves myriads of elements to convert carbs, protein and water into energy.

When to eat: While there are many theories as to when to eat, there is one major principle that is well understood and is critical to optimal health: Sugar Management. Body converts carbohydrates into glucose (sugars) before they can be converted to energy using the Krebs cycle. Rate at which carbs convert to sugars depends on the glycemic index of the specific food. And, how much sugar is generated, also called glycemic load, in this process is based on glycemic index and the quantity of food.

Body either uses up all the glucose it generates or it stores away what it cannot use in the form of body fat. For optimal health, one must eat just enough, so that all of it can be converted into stored energy rather than stored fat. This means eating meals more often, if necessary, to not generate excess that will have to be stored away as fat.

Bottom line and My Personal Plan: Given all these factors, you can easily imagine why there is much room for controversy about what to eat, how much to eat and when to eat.

When one expert says, “Just figure out  how many calories you need and then simply eat that many calories.”

Next expert might say, “Not true, because you still need all of the elements 1 through 7 that body needs. That is why, 2500 calories from sodas is not the same as 2500 calories from fruits and vegetables.”

Yet, third expert may argue that if you are missing just a few key ingredients, your energy cycle may be all messed up and nothing else will matter.

So, what is one to do? The best answer, I have synthesized from all those book and resources I mentioned in part I, is as follows. I am here using my personal example to illustrate. These days, my weight is 161 (plus minus 2 lbs.)

  1. Decide how many calories you need to consume in a day, based on your build and life style (usually 2300 calories to 2800 calories):

In my case, I decided about 2500 calories meet my daily need.

  1. If you are not at optimal percent body fat, reduce the calorie in-take by 20%

So in my case, since I am still working on losing body fat, I budgeted 2500 x 80% = 2000 calories

  1. 15% should come from fat

For me, 2000 x 15% = 300 calories. 300/9 = 33 grams of fat

  1. Budget 1 gram per pound of body weight for protein.

For me: 160 grams of proteins. 160gms x 4 cals/ gm = 640 calories

  1. What remains is budget for carbs. Thus, Calories from carbs = Total Calorie budget – fat cals – protein calories. Divide by 4 for number of grams of carbs.

So my daily intake budgets are:

  • Total 2000 calories
  • 300 cals from fat, i.e., 33 gms
  • 640 cals from protein, i.e., 160 gms
  • 1060 cals from carbs, i.e., 265 gms.
  1. Use fruits and vegetables as the basis for carbs that will not only meet carb requirements but also most of the micro nutrients. It is really easy to blow carbs budget with breads and pasta, and most of those also have very high glycemic load.
  2. Use your choice of protein sources for the budgeted amount of protein requirement. Again, be careful in selecting protein sources, since it is very easy to blow the fat budget with poor choice of protein sources.
  3. Break up intake into at least six meals and mix proteins with carbs for each meal to keep sugar level throughout out the day and also prevent spikes after each meal.

For one day, I did a complete journal of what I ate and also using resources on the Internet figured calories for carbs, proteins and fats. This was a particular intense day during my 21-day Muscle Mania challenge. I don’t always do strength training workout with my trainer and Bikram yoga the same day.

Below here is the result. Remember, I am a vegetarian and I have been using Whey Protein as my major source of protein.

You can Click on the picture to enlarge it, if it is not readable.

Meal Planner and Journal for Ashok

What do you think of this approach?

Do you feel that this simplifies the mumbo jumbo of what to eat, how much to eat and when to eat for optimal health?

Do you see a hole in this approach? What would you do differently?

Post #20 – So, how much muscle can you gain in a short period and why you may want to?

10 Sunday Aug 2014

Posted by in Aging, Bikram Yoga, Biomarkers for Stress, Ideal Body Weight, Lean Mass, Life-Span, Living to 120, Optimal Health, Percent Body Fat, Vitality, wellness, Yoga

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In most health literature, one thing I find repeated over and over again is that muscle or lean body mass is a very important factor for health and longevity.

When I heard from Joe Dillon about 15 months ago a concrete technique to lose body fat and gain muscle mass, I got inspired. Although, I had generally been keeping track of my weight, up until then I had never really thought of tracking or targeting body fat and lean mass directly.

More I studied this topic, the more it all made sense. Weight and Body Mass Index (BMI) are just proxy for tracking body fat and lean mass, which are what really count. It is the body fat that is harmful and it is the lean mass that is helpful – and both in so many different ways. And, at times BMI and body fat can be very poor approximation of body fat and lean mass.

If in the process of losing weight, you lose muscle mass rather than fat, that is not a good thing at all. In fact, that can be very harmful to your health. Mark Hyman, MD talks about a term call skinny fat to describe someone who looks quite skinning, has good weight, but the weight is very disproportionately fat mass.

William Evans, Ph.D. and Irwin Rosenberg, MD in their seminal work, Biomarkers, The 10 Determinants of Aging You Can Control,” coined the term Sarcopenia, to describe a “disease” when someone lacks adequate lean body mass.

Jim Karas, in his book, The Business Plan for the Body”, calls lean mass the net worth. When he talks to business people, who understand financials, he explains weight, muscle and fat this way: weight is your total assets, fat is total debt and lean muscle mass is your equity or net worth. And, if you do nothing, starting with age 30, you lose muscle mass, about 7 lbs. per decade for men and women, and accelerating to one pound per year after menopause for women. So, if you do nothing to counteract, by the age of 60, you will have lost 21 lbs. of muscle mass and replaced with 21 plus your weight gained, since the age of 30, in body fat. Is that 31 lbs. or 41 lbs. or more of additional body fat? Yikes!

You get the idea.

Through all this studying, I found a new way to articulate that object of the game (or obsession) of weight loss, i.e., to simply target and measure percent body fat. And, Joe Dillon provided ideal targets. He feels that for optimal health men should have no more than 15% body fat, while woman should have no more than 22%. Further, he says, that the world class male athletes have body fat percent in the range of 6 to 12% and female athletes in the range of 12% to 18%.

So, instead of looking up on the BMI tables to estimate what ideal body weight should be, a precise method is:

Ideal weight = Body Fat Weight/0.15 for 15% body fat target.

Where, Body Fat Weight = Current Weight * Current % body fat

Current % body fat is measureable by taking seven different measurements with calipers and them plugging into calculator.

With all this knowledge in hand, I started my journey. On May 17, 2013, started with these measurements:

Table 4

Notice that in May 2013, at 23.9% body fat, my ideal weight was150.0 lbs. And, as it generally happens if I were to lose 17.5 lbs to get to 150.0, it will prTable 1obably not all be body fat. So, as more weight I lost lower my ideal body weight would need to be. No wonder this is a sucker’s game (or obsession)!

My goal was to lose body fat, while at the same time gain lean mass!

I changed my diet per Joe Dillon’s recommendations. Basically, took breads and sweets totally out of my meals and all processed foods, added more raw fruits and vegetables, decreased quantity of what I would eat and added about 150 grams of proteins through Whey concentrate and isolate shakes. I kept to my then most recent routine of one fitness/resistance training workout and two to three Bikram Yoga sessions a week.

I progressed along pretty well as you can see in the table below, especially through the end of the year.

Table 5

Every month I was losing about a pound of fat and gaining a pound of lean mass. That seemed very encouraging. After a few months of watching that trend, I even raised my target. I started to ask, “Wouldn’t it be cool to get six-pack at sixty?” I have never had six-pack abs before. Why not? May be 12% body fat would do it.

And, then starting beginning of year, the progress sort of plateaued. In April, I added to my weekly workout routine Joe Dillon’s power walks with weights about three days a week. And, I started to make a very gentle progress again.

About then, I did some blood work and found out that my testosterone was low. Aha, may be that was the reason my progress had stalled! I theorized. Low-T and elevated estradiol wreaks havoc on lean mass for muscle. “Man boobs” are signs of low-T and elevated estradiol in men. Health literature is quite sure about this, e.g., check out, Testosterone for Life: Recharge Your Vitality, Sex Drive, Muscle Mass, and Overall Health by Abraham Morgentaler, MD.

So, I started to work on that through herbal supplements, which is still work-in-progress and another story for another day. Joe Dillon recommends getting that test up-front, which I did not do, so I did not really have any baseline numbers to compare.

About a month ago, I saw an exercise program by Shawn Phillips, who is a world class body sculptor. He called this program, Muscle Mania – a program made up of intense workouts, one muscle a day, every single day for 21 days. His promise was add 4 pound of muscle mass in 21 days.

I talked to our trainer Saleem and my wife Kimberly. Both were encouraging and we went for it. Starting July 16th, for the next 21 mornings, under Saleem’s coaching Kimberly and I worked out. (Actually on day 20, I did not feel well, so we skipped a day and finished the program in 22 days). For 21 days, we bombed one muscle group every morning: chest, biceps/triceps, legs, back, shoulders in whatever order and with whatever exercises the program recommended. Some days, I felt totally exhausted, some days very energized. But we pushed through it and finished the program as intended.

My right shoulder stiffened up a little during one of the bench press exercises. So, I started using the foam roller for rolling. Found it to be incredible beneficial. From then on, I incorporated about 10 minute of rolling as part of the warm up routine. Jeffry S. Life, MD Ph.D. in his book, “The Life Plan: How Any Man Can Achieve Lasting Health, Great Sex, and a Stronger, Leaner Body” recommends rolling for warm-ups and flexibility by working on the fascia.

So, here is the result.

Table 6

As of August 9, if I am measuring, it correctly (Kimberly did the measuring wherever I can’t reach), I have achieved 15.1% body fat! And, as the table shows my weight of 161.0 is the same as ideal weight of 160.9 at 15% body fat.

I did not really do the measurements before and after the 21-day program. But no doubt, I made most of this progress between May and August during the 21-day program. During this period, I lost 4 lbs. of body fat and gained 2 lbs. lean mass.

And, I can see hints of my six-pack! It seems like 12% body fat will surely make my abs visible.

So, there you have it – the story of my chase for 15% body fat and in turn for my ideal weight.

I definitely, feel more energized. This has also brought my cholesterol in line. I quit taking Lipitor last year in May, the same time I started this journey. And, the most recent blood work showed total cholesterol of 145, LDL of 88, HDL 43 and Triglycerides of 69. That is the best it has been even with Lipitor!

To continue the progress, for the near future, Kimberly and I are planning on two days of strength/resistance training, two days of some aerobics including power walks and two days of Bikram Yoga for flexibility, balance and cleansing the internal organs.

What are your thoughts or comments on this whole endeavor?

If any of this helps you or inspires you to take on some health challenge, I would love to hear about it and/or answer any questions you may have.